This calculator provides thickness guidelines when working on models that will be scaled down before 3D Printing

In architecture as well as in other industries, a 3D Print is a scaled down representation of a real world design. Architectural CAD packages like Autodesk Revit, Sketchup and Rhino draw at real world scale, 1:1. However, If you scale a 4mm thick piece of glass for a 1:100 model (~ 1/8" pane on a 1" = 8' model) you get a surface .04mm thick (.001inches) . This is too thin for almost all 3D Printers. Our team at LGM uses this calculator daily to help thicken parts for architectural 3D Printing. If you are interested in other solutions see our CADspan software.

Directions
Chose if you are working in Architectural US units or Metric with the radio buttons.
Chose a scale factor. This can be input as a decimal percentage, ratio or in Architectural units in the 1' = x format.
Finally select a target 3D Printing technology.
The CADspan Calculator will then provide guidance on how thick various elements need to be at real world scale in order to meet practical 3D Printing limitations.
Please click on the category headers for more information on those architectural features and how they are resolved when they are 3D Printed.
If you are interested in a particular feature size either at real world or model scale you can use the last row. Input one variable and the other is calculated.